Jane, Just a note from someone who teaches an environmental science course. First, which skeptical communities have you in mind? Are they susceptible to data? If I remember correctly, the Rodale Institute (2006, a bit dated) published data from a long-term study of corn yields comparing organic (not till and tilled) to conventional methods and to the Pennsylvania average (Rodale is in PA) and found that organic yield was higher, so it is not clear that you first assertion is true for all crops. I am not aware of a review of conventional vs organic yields for lots of crops but I suspect one or several exist and, if you or someone else can give us the references, I would appreciate it. The second part would need some specifics. What sort of harm to the environment do you have in mind? Certainly, organic methods look better for the environment than the ~325 million pounds of excess glyphosate spread across American fields in the years from 1996 until 2009 due to overuse of Roundup Ready crops (Union of Concerned Science report). At first pass, I am having trouble imagining types of environmental damage organic farming makes worse but I might be missing the obvious, so could you be more specific. One comment as well: BASF had made the claim that their Haber-Bosch process made it possible for the Earth’s population to grow beyond 4 billion. If their claim is valid in any sense, what is the most probable long-term outcome from agricultural policy that always sets increased yield as its goal?
Phil Ganter Biological Sciences Tennessee State University From: "Ecological Society of America: grants, jobs, news" <ECOLOG-L@LISTSERV.UMD.EDU<mailto:ECOLOG-L@LISTSERV.UMD.EDU>> on behalf of Jane Shevtsov <jane....@gmail.com<mailto:jane....@gmail.com>> Reply-To: Jane Shevtsov <jane....@gmail.com<mailto:jane....@gmail.com>> Date: Tuesday, March 21, 2017 at 12:39 PM To: "ECOLOG-L@LISTSERV.UMD.EDU<mailto:ECOLOG-L@LISTSERV.UMD.EDU>" <ECOLOG-L@LISTSERV.UMD.EDU<mailto:ECOLOG-L@LISTSERV.UMD.EDU>> Subject: [ECOLOG-L] Organic Agriculture Lately, a lot of people in skeptical communities have been saying that not only does organic agriculture use more land than conventional, it's no better or even worse for the environment overall. What do those of you with expertise in agroecology think about this? Jane -- ------------- Jane Shevtsov, Ph.D. Lecturer and DBER Fellow, UCLA co-founder, www.worldbeyondborders.org<http://www.worldbeyondborders.org> "Muad'Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It's shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult." --Frank Herbert, Dune
